Chapter 27
Nicholas
Ten months’ later, I am promoted to VP – Latin America and Caribbean, meaning I have a dotted line to Lisa in the Org Chart and frequently sit in meetings with her… Lisa being the chair for the vast majority of them.
Under normal circumstances, I’d be ecstatic about a promotion. But these aren’t normal times. Things will become tricky with this development. Adding to my dilemma, I am now employed to State Foods, Inc.
As I said, things will become tricky.
Before the promotion, I was routinely flying to New York once a month for Lisa, including on the weekend of her anniversary.
No surprise she chose to spend time with me, forgoing the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to eat at the same restaurant she goes to every year for her anniversary and birthday.
“Congrats, sweetie. I’m so happy for you. You so deserve this. Let’s go out and celebrate this weekend,” Emily enthuses, running from the kitchen to hug me. She was anxiously waiting for me to come home after I had shared the news with her earlier.
“Thanks, babe,” I feign nonchalance as if it isn’t a big deal, taking off my shoes and throwing my bag on the couch. She is definitely over the moon; she doesn’t even give me a piece of her mind for throwing my dirty bag on the couch.
“Now, we can finally afford to buy the TV for the kitchen that I asked about yesterday,” she jokes, kissing me on the cheek.
I love her sense of humour and can’t get enough of it. The kiss on the cheek quickly escalates to something more. Like it always does.
After going back and forth with HR and the board of directors for months, Emily finally got approval to work remotely and had moved to Jamaica ten weeks ago.
We rented a two-bedroom house in Jacks Hill with a breathtaking view. And you can’t have a house with a big yard and not have a dog. So, we got a German Sheperd, Chubble. I had suggested the name, German, but she shut it down and chose Chubble — an endearing way to say trouble in Jamaica.
After having our fun in the living room, mostly on the couch, we shower together because, what can I say, we’re still in the honeymoon phase. Emily has an urgent deliverable to finish for work so she powers up the laptop and gets to work at her desk.
I am still uneasy about the whole situation at work, so I pour myself a glass of scotch, sit on the couch and browse the internet.
Still feeling uneasy about everything — one glass of scotch becomes two glasses of scotch, then two glasses of scotch become three glasses of scotch.
Thhhheeen thhreeeee gllllasss of scccottttch…
Somewhere along the line, I get up and make my way to bed, leaving a blurry image of Emily sitting at her desk hard at work.
“Goodnight, babe,” she waves, “I’ll join you in an hour or so.”
I wave back and then collapse on the Alaska king bed.
◆◆◆
Emily is restless all night, which keeps me awake. I don’t say anything though, instead I lie there wondering what is bothering her.
At some point, I must have knocked out, in spite of her tossing and turning.
When the alarm goes off at 5:45am, she is nowhere to be found when I turn in the bed so as to face her.
Pulling her close and wrapping my arms around her as we spoon is the best part of our day and I am missing it.
During these moments we inhale the fresh morning air, which is especially nice in the hills, and dose off for a few more minutes.
Wait, something is off. And I’m not referring to my headache. I hear the alarm but it’s coming from outside the bedroom. Confused, I roll out of bed and drag myself to the living room where the phone is buzzing on the couch.
Oh right, I had left it there last night.
I turn off the alarm and out of habit unlock the phone to check my messages. A bad habit I need to curtail; checking messages first thing in the morning.
I am shell-shocked.
There is an open email from Lisa in my personal account, “Congratulations. Your promotion is fully deserved and based on merit. I didn’t want you to think I had influenced the decision because of what you mean to me.
Can’t wait to celebrate with you. Let me know if you can come to New York this weekend. ”
I don’t remember reading this email. But it was read.
Confused, I navigate to screen timeout on the phone settings. It says five minutes.
I lock the phone and toss it on the couch.
Anxious, I drag myself around the house looking for Emily, eventually finding her outside walking Chubble. Something we usually do together in the mornings.
“Good morning, luv,” I say.
She waves and continues to walk Chubble. That’s it. She doesn’t even tell me “Good morning.”
While getting ready for work, I replay last night, over and over again, desperately trying to remember something useful but coming up blank.
How could Lisa send a note like that? … Although it was an email, we had agreed not to send anything that could implicate us. What the hell is wrong with her?
While waiting for Emily to finish getting dressed, I sit on the couch and stare at the email. I am hoping it will evoke a memory from last night. Still, nothing.
“I’m ready,” Emily says, walking into the living room and picking up her bag, signalling it is time to go.
She is still getting used to driving on the opposite side of the road, so I drop her at the office space she rents — on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings.
She is uncharacteristically quiet on the drive to work.
“The new pickleball court is now open,” I say, pointing to the state-of-the-art facility. “We should check it out this weekend.”
“Yea, sure,” she replies, when not so long ago she was frequently checking social media for updates on the opening date.
“The new season of You is coming out on Netflix tomorrow.”
“Yea, I saw that,” is her response to the show she literally binged-watched in one weekend, barely moving to eat.
“Are you okay?” I ask.
“Yeah, I am. Just a little tired. That’s all.”
And that pretty much sums up how the conversation went for the rest of the commute. Me trying to find things she was gung-ho about; she barely responding.
As I pull up to the entrance of the twelve-storey building, I give her a chups before she gets out of the car. “See you later hun.”
“Thanks love. Have a good day.” I can tell something really, really heavy is on her mind. She is fidgety, making three attempts to grab her coffee from the cup holder. And if that wasn’t enough, she left her phone in the car, banging on my car window right before I drive under the barrier.
On my way to work, alone in the car, I try to remember everything that had happened last night to the best of my unsober ability.
If she had seen the email, surely she would have brought it up immediately and demanded answers.
It has to be something else. I replay our conversations, over and over in my head…
to see if I had said anything inappropriate.
Nothing. Oh wait, maybe it’s something I did.
Was it because I had stepped outside to take a call?
(because I didn’t want to disturb her while she completed her urgent work assignment).
Did I leave the toilet seat up again? Alright, now I’m just being ridiculous.
I have no idea what is going on, but I just know it’s very serious. Major. And I don’t think it’s the email.
Yup, I am right. Less than an hour later, she messages me:
“Hey you. Can we talk tonight?”
“Sure. Am I in trouble?” I ask. But she had texted ‘Hey you’, so I doubt I’m in serious trouble. I am relieved. Thank God. I can finally concentrate on work. I would have been legit worried sick if she had sent: Nick. We need to talk tonight. Or worse: Nicholas. We need to talk tonight.
“No. I need to speak to you about something important when we get home.”
“Okay, sounds good. I’ll pick you up at 4:30pm.”
Okay, I lied, I cannot concentrate on work. Still overthinking things, I go on the road to keep busy and to get a few important things done.
I arrive at her rental space twenty minutes earlier than the agreed 4:30pm pick-up time. I am anxious to hear what she has to say. Plus, let’s keep it real, it’s not like I was being productive at work. Actually, I wasn’t even physically there for most of the day.
“Hey, I’m downstairs whenever you’re ready. I’m reading something for work. So, take your time,” I WhatsApp her, looking on the message periodically to see when the two ticks turn blue. Apparently, the blue ticks did not make her move faster as at 4:30pm on the dot I see her exiting the building.
On the way home, we get caught in bumper-to-bumper traffic, the result of a sudden major power outage that is disrupting the traffic lights.
Motorists are honking wildly and vehicles are blocking major intersections, further delaying the time to get home.
I am getting impatient. “So… what’s been on your mind dear?
” I ask while turning down the volume on the radio.
“It’s too noisy and chaotic… when we get home,” Emily responds before switching the topic. “On the weekend we should drive to Ocho Rios and try out the new ice cream place, Cool Dung, that everyone’s been talking about.”
“You really want to drive an hour and a half… just for ice cream?”
“Totally. Everyone says it’s the best ice cream they’ve ever had, even Karen from yoga and she hates everything that’s unhealthy, except Moscato.”
Emily has done a 180 and is now in a good mood. Back to being fun Emily.
Three hours later, we are still crawling in the traffic.
So much for beating the 5:00pm traffic and reaching home in twenty-five minutes.
At least the foot of the hill is now in sight, less than a hundred meters away.
I switch the playlist to love songs, setting the mood for what I hope will be a good night.
Thinking Out Loud by Ed Sheeran is first up.
I reach across the automatic transmission and cover her hand with mine. Listening to romantic music and navigating the car up the hill, dodging the potholes I know from memory… my thoughts drift to how remarkable it is to have someone who completes me in every way.
As we get home, I go straight to the kitchen and warm up the leftovers from Sunday’s dinner. Then, we make our way to the patio and, sitting at the bistro table, recap the best and funniest parts of our day… This has become our little tradition. Our little thing.
“Should I get ice cream?” I ask, after we finish dinner.
“I’m pretty sure we ate it off last week,” she replies.
“Okay, let me check to make sure.”
I come back from the kitchen with three flavours from Cool Dung. “Found it!”
“Wait. What! How did you know to get that?” she beams, like a child opening their gift on Christmas morning.
“Today, their Instagram page popped up in my feed and I noticed you liked their page and a few of their photos. Actually, you practically liked all four hundred of their photos. So, I wanted to surprise you. Surprise!” I say goofily, throwing my hands in the air.
“Aww… that’s so sweet babes… you did that just for me… I love you.”
“I love you too.”
We enjoy the ice cream quietly on the porch swing. She likely enjoying it more than she naturally would have because of my thoughtfulness to drive all that way to surprise her. Licking the spoon clean, Emily moans when it hits the spot.
Breaking the silence, as nice as it is, I call Chubble over to hang with us. “Here boy.” Chubble wags his tail and comes running to us from wherever he was digging up the garden. Unable to resist him, Emily pets and invites him to climb up and sit… this puts her further at ease.
The three of us sit there enjoying the magical view of the city. Relaxed.
“So, what’s been on your mind sweetie?” I ask, gently rubbing her arm. Then, using both feet, I push the swing backward.
As the swing gently rocks back and forth, Emily pulls closer, then, looking up at me declares, “I’m pregnant, Nick.”